I keep thinking how much less uncomfortable this moment would have been for Chancellor Katehi…
…if the students had been chanting shame.
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Mike De SistiFrom its headquarters at 1241 N. Franklin Place on Milwaukee's lower east side, the low-profile Bradley Foundation gives away millions of dollars every year, acting like a venture capital fund for conservative ideas. |
Ten of thousands protest military rule in Cairo’s Tahrir Square yesterday.
Make some noise! Occupy Wall Street is organizing a 24 hour drum circle outside Mayor One Percent’s upper east side townhouse starting today.
UC Davis students make University Chancellor do a perp walk. Following the national outrage at police pepper spraying non-violent student protesters, Chancellor Katehi first hides in her office, then walks to her car past hundreds of silent students. Amazing.
There’s more coming out about the Obama administration’s role in the police crackdown of OWS camps.
The police violence on display at UC Davis this Friday is not the first of its kind in response to the Occupy Wall Street movement. As I wrote yesterday, a similar incident involving police beating protesters at UC Berkeley happened this past Tuesday. There have been numerous other incidents as well, from Seattle to Portland toOakland to New York City and elsewhere.
In some ways, I see these police clashes with protesters as a physical manifestation of the culture war. Indeed, as much as the Occupy movement is about economic inequality, it too is just a larger manifestation of the culture war. This was painfully obvious when the ‘We Are the 53%” Tumblr came out.
Garance Franke-Ruta has a round-up of these police excesses at The Atlantic. She writes:
Just over two months old, it has succeed in changing the terms of the national debate about
originally posted Nov 20, 2009
It’s not a surprise that there are stumbles along the new road of School Choice to our difficult and deceptively “improved” status quo.
While the New Orleans community has successfully created an unprecedented number of school choices, scores of families still struggle to take advantage of them. *
From the beginning, I felt and said the kind of shopping around, school visits and research School Choice here requires is directly in opposition to a large targeted population, its resources and needs. Just because there are computers at the public library doesn’t mean they are instantly and perfectly accessible when this or that particular parent can get there. And should you have to be computer literate to get your child into a decent–not good but decent—school? I still assert that as US citizens in a democracy the answer to that question has to be, cannot be anything but, No.
Yet one of the greatest challenges moving forward will be to ensure that the best schools do not simply go to the families with the connections, knowledge and time to navigate the complicated
Given the recent events at Sac City Unified (a sampling of links below), it’s important to bring this blog back to life. Read the history in the archives, and check back often for updates and discussion.
East Sacramento parents seek traditional high school amid district shake-up
Sac City middle school consolidation plan criticized
A.M. Winn May Close, Bringing More Students to Rosemont
1. The protest at which UC Davis police officers used pepper spray and batons against unresisting demonstrators was an entirely nonviolent one.
None of the arrests at UC Davis in the current wave of activism have been for violent offenses. Indeed, as the New York Times reported this morning, the university’s administration has “reported no instances of violence by any protesters.” Not one.
2. The unauthorized tent encampment had been dismantled well before the pepper spraying began.
On Thursday, students had set up tents on campus, and the administration had allowed them to stay up overnight. When campus police ordered students to take the tents down on Friday afternoon, most complied. The remainder of the tents were quickly removed by police without incident.
3. Students did not restrict the movement of police at any time during the demonstration.
After police made a handful of arrests in the course of taking down the students’ tents, some of the remaining demonstrators formed a wide seated circle around the officers and arrestees. UC Davis police
Driving up to Toms River, NJ and back yesterday made me think, “You know….traffic is a true reflection of the challenges we face in society today."
Think about it. How many of these situations have you experienced?
IN recent years, we’ve been treated to reams of op-ed articles about how we need better teachers in our public schools and, if only the teachers’ unions would go away, our kids would score like Singapore’s on the big international tests. There’s no question that a great teacher can make a huge difference in a student’s achievement, and we need to recruit, train and reward more such teachers. But here’s what some new studies are also showing: We need better parents. Parents more focused on their children’s education can also make a huge difference in a student’s achievement.
Thomas L. Friedman
Readers shared their thoughts on this article.
How do we know? Every three years, the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development, or O.E.C.D., conducts exams as part of the Program for International Student Assessment, or PISA, which tests 15-year-olds in the world’s leading industrialized nations on their reading
The now-viral video of police officers in their Robocop costumessadistically pepper-spraying peaceful, sitting protesters at UC-Davis (details here) shows a police state in its pure form. It’s easy to be outraged by this incident as though it’s some sort of shocking aberration, but that is exactly what it is not. The Atlantic‘s Garance Franke-Rutaadeptly demonstrates with an assemblage of video how common such excessive police force has been in response to the Occupy protests. Along those lines, there are several points to note about this incident and what it reflects:
The idea that a teacher's pay should be tied to student scores is not only ludicrous but downright stupid. This is a business model, not an educational model. It is also a political model, in that politicians can solve any problem with one solution.
Know your FCAT. The Florida Comprehensive Assessment Test was originally designed as a remedial tool. Students were to take the test and the teachers would get the results back showing in what areas students needed help.
This never worked because the company that graded the test
UC Davis Chancellor Linda Katehi remained inside Surge II for nearly three hours Saturday after hundreds of protesters surrounded the building, interrupting her news conference about the pepper-spraying of protesters by campus police the day before.
Protesters showed up minutes after the 4 p.m. conference began. Their voices could be heard within the building.
Many of those who had gathered outside said they believed Katehi did not give the UCD community sufficient notice and that the choice of venue was unfair because it did not permit the general public inside.
“After what happened yesterday, everyone is really, really angry,” said Steve Cox, a UCD graduate student. “It’s kind of unfair for her to hold a press
11-17-2011 | On Wednesday, the California State University trustees voted 9-6 to raise tuition by another $500, bringing the yearly total with fees for an undergraduate to $7,000. The increase will have both immediate and long-term effects.
Hundreds of students protested at the trustees meeting in Long Beach. Lt. Gov. Gavin Newsom, a trustee who voted against the measure, said the hike was tantamount to a “tax on the middle class and a tax on our future.” Also opposing the tuition increase, Trustee Jillian Ruddell said, “we need to send the message that students are a priority and education is essential to the success of
